One of the most difficult aspects of losing weight and improving your health is remaining motivated. Regardless of your personal reasons for pursuing better health, the discipline and effort required in this endeavor can eventually leave you feeling demotivated.

How do you maintain or even improve your motivation when losing weight for better health?

The Impediments to Motivation

There are several things that can derail your weight loss motivation. Pursuing weight loss the traditional way demands a lot of effort and discipline, so after a few weeks, it's easy to feel a bit burned out. After weeks of denying yourself tasty foods, choking down more water, and going to the gym every day, your initial wave of ambition may wear off.

Additionally, even slight deviations from your intended goals can be soul-crushing. If you do everything “right” and still weigh in heavier than the week before, it may cause you to question why you're even putting yourself through this.

Fortunately, there are some solutions that can get you over these motivational doldrums.

The Rising Influence of Weight Loss Medications

Increasingly, people are turning to the help of weight loss medications to overcome their motivational hurdles. According to Dr. Michael Snyder at FuturHealth, there are now multiple weight loss medications that have been proven effective – and safe. Semaglutide (Ozempic) and Tirzepatide (Zepbound) are two examples. These relatively new weight loss medications have a similar effect, introducing the natural hormones GLP-1 (and GIP, in the case of Zepbound), which facilitate weight loss in a few different ways.

For starters, these hormones facilitate the release of insulin in your bloodstream, helping to stabilize your blood sugar. Additionally, these hormones interact with your brain, aiding you in feeling satisfied after eating – and can curtail your appetite.

Weight loss medications like these aren't miracle cures; they aren't going to make you skinny overnight. However, they can be powerful tools in assisting your weight loss efforts – and making your journey to your final goals much easier. They could be exactly what you need to overcome your declining motivation.

Keep in mind that these drugs won't work right away. You'll likely need to continue taking them for several months for best results – while preserving the good habits you've already started building.

Other Sources of Motivation

You can spark even more motivation with the following strategies:

  •         Optimize for sustainable changes. Many people lose motivation because they strive for habits that are simply unsustainable. You might be able to survive on a hard-boiled egg and an apple a day for a few days, but if you go much longer than that, you'll lose your mind (and put your health in jeopardy). Instead, optimize for new lifestyle habits that you can follow indefinitely. For example, you can commit to going to the gym three or four times per week.
  •         Remember why you're doing this. Remind yourself why you're doing this. Do you want to feel more confident? Do you want to live longer? Do you want to play with your kids without losing your breath? Write down all the reasons why you're trying to lose weight and make those words visible, so you can always remember them.
  •         Focus on what you can control. Self-determinative attitudes are more positively linked with long-term behavioral changes. In other words, people who believe they have control over their weight are much more likely to lose weight successfully. Shift your mentality by focusing on everything within the bounds of your control. You can control what you eat. You can control what you do with your body. You may not have unlimited time or money, but those are aspects of life that you can't control – and it's not productive to dwell on them.
  •         Don't be too strict. Be wary of being too strict or too harsh on yourself. There's nothing wrong with having an occasional sweet treat or taking an extra rest day, even when you're trying to lose weight. If you're too hard on yourself, you will eventually collapse.
  •         Get support from friends and family members. Ask your friends and family members for motivation and support. Express what you're feeling and request help in whatever form you feel would be most useful to you.
  •         Plan rewards for yourself. Plan rewards for yourself for when you reach your goals. At various milestones, plan little gifts or celebrations that encourage you to keep going. Even something simple, like going out to eat or watching your favorite movie at home can be motivating.

Motivation is hard to come by, especially when you're weeks deep in a weight loss campaign that seems to be stalling out. But with the help of better, more effective weight loss drugs and a handful of inspiring sources of motivation, you can power through and ultimately reach your goal weight.